Cupakes Make My World Go Round

I've always loved baking, since I can remember. Saturday mornings waking up to warm, fresh baked blueberry muffins. Special occasions when we got to spend time baking cakes.

Unfortunately we've never really been a "from scratch" baking family. When it came to traditional American cakes and muffins, I can't remember a time when we made everything from scratch. My mom was great at making Indian sweets and baked goods from scratch, but the American goods seemed to be beyond us.

So I grew up on boxed cupcakes and brownies, watching cooking and baking shows on television, watching how amazing these bakers were, how they could make anything from scratch after just thinking about it for a few seconds.

Years and years went by, and through everything my love for baked goods, especially cupcakes, never wavered. Eventually, the rest of the world caught up with me. It seemed like cupcakes became a new thing, there were TV shows and specials on cupcakes and cupcake bakeries, or cupcakeries, were popping up left and right. My favorites were 'DC Cupcakes' and 'Cupcake Wars'.  I even went so far as to visit the location for 'DC Cupcakes', Georgetown Cupcake:

Finally! The rest of the world (or at least America) realized how awesome cupcakes were and how much everyone should appreciate them. Unfortunately, this big wave of cupcakes also came at the same time I was sent to Uganda, East Africa, to serve as a Peace Corps volunteer. I accepted the post as a community health volunteer with the idea that I would be losing the ability to eat my beloved sweets for the next 27 months. I stuff my mouth with cupcakes, brownies, muffins, and anything else that I could bake. It was a glorious month of gaining weight which I believed I would lose, since I was moving to Africa.

When I got to Uganda, I was met with the reality that baking would be next to impossible. Fortunately, I had a friend who showed me how to make cupcakes with my rice cooker (see my first attempt). I was content with this, happy I could at least get a taste of the glory every once in a while.

Then I went to Kampala and found two cafes that served cupcakes. After this encounter, I wondered, do other cities in the world have the love for cupcakes I naively thought was only found in America? I did a quick Google search and found some surprising and uplifting results! 

That's when I decided to create this blog. I love to travel, and while in the Peace Corps I did a great deal of it. I thought to myself, why not find a cupcake bakery in each city or country I visit, in an attempt to find the ultimate red velvet cupcake (that's my favorite).

So here goes...I'll just judging them on my own very subjective way, but you'll get all my thoughts and comments.

Join me on an epic journey to find the one red velvet to rule them all!